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Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2020 11:19:16 +0000
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To: PHP Internals <internals@lists.php.net>
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Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] What about a magic __toArray() method?
From: rowan.collins@gmail.com (Rowan Tommins)

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On Tue, 4 Feb 2020 at 10:37, Marco Pivetta <ocramius@gmail.com> wrote:

> Correct: an explicit `$foo->toArray()` call suffices.
>
> For other readers, more about `$foo->toArray()` vs `(array) $foo` is
> described at
>
> https://github.com/ShittySoft/symfony-live-berlin-2018-doctrine-tutorial/pull/3#issuecomment-460441229
>


The pros and cons of overloading casts are roughly the same as those of
operator overloading in general:

on one hand:
+ It is more succinct than calling a method
+ It aids creation of richer Domain Specific Languages
on the other:
- It is less explicit than choosing a purpose-specific method name
- It is less flexible than having multiple related methods, or a method
with parameters
- It is harder to predict behaviour at a glance


> Or we can deprecate __toString() method at all and detect cast events
> instead. Would it make more sense? Something like this __casted().

If there was a good case made for how it should work, I'd be more
supportive of a general feature to overload casting, rather than making
(array) a special case.

One of many challenges would be working out when the cast should happen
implicitly. Should "iterable $foo" trigger an array cast if the object
isn't iterable? Should foreach()? Should strict_types change that behaviour
as it does for __toString(), even though it currently only applies to
scalar types?

Regards,
-- 
Rowan Tommins
[IMSoP]

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